TCW v. Gundlach (Los Angeles, California)

Trust Company of the West (TCW) sued Jeffrey Gundlach and three other defendants for allegedly stealing the company’s trade secrets and using them to open a rival asset management company, DoubleLine Capital. Gundlach counterclaimed for hundreds of millions of dollars for breach of his employment contract.

Jonathan Quinn (Quinn Emmanuel Urquhart Oliver & Sullivan), counsel for TCW, stated, “Gundlach stole so many trade secrets and confidential information that, if you printed it out, it would be 2½ times the height of the Empire State building.” According to Mr. Quinn, TCW “owed Mr. Gundlach nothing” because he and the other defendants “plotted the destruction of TCW.”

DoubleLine’s attorney, Brad Brian (Munger Tolles & Olson), told the jury about TCW’s alleged plot to force Mr. Gundlach out of the company as early as June 2009. According to Mr. Brian, TCW wanted to avoid having to pay Mr. Gundlach “hundreds of millions in dollars in performance fees for asset funds that had gone through the roof.” Mr. Brian told the jury, “They knew they were going to owe him a lot of money.”

Mr. Brian emphasized that Mr. Gundlach and the other defendants did not use any of TCW’s confidential information when they formed DoubleLine Capital LP. He also told the jury that Mr. Gundlach and the other defendants were entitled to unpaid wages from TCW.

The jury sided with Mr. Gundlach on his breach of contract claim, and awarded Mr. Gundlach $66.7M in unpaid wages.  However, the jury also found that Mr. Gundlach stole TCW’s trade secrets.  Judge Carl West may award damages for the trade secrets violation at a future hearing.

John Quinn (Quinn Emmanuel Urquhart Oliver & Sullivan), Steve Madison (Quinn Emmanuel Urquhart Oliver & Sullivan), and Dominic Suprenant (Quinn Emmanuel Urquhart Oliver & Sullivan) appeared on behalf of the plaintiff, TCW. Mark Helm (Munger Tolles & Olson) and Brad Brian (Munger Tolles & Olson) appeared on behalf of the defendants, Jeffrey Gundlach, Jeffrey Mayberry, Chris Santa Ana, and Barbara Van Every.

Gavel-to-gavel coverage is available from Courtroom View Network.

CVN webcast Trust Company of the West, Inc. v. Jeffrey Gundlach live. 

The MPEG LA v. Alcatel Lucent trial has settled, it was announced this morning, immediately prior to what would have been the third day of testimony.  No details of the settlement were to be placed on the record. 

CVN webcast the first two days of testimony live. 

The MPEG LA v. Alcatel Lucent trial began this morning with Sullivan & Cromwell attorney Garrard Beeney’s direct examination of Alcatel Lucent’s SVP of intellectual property, Barbara A. Landmann, before Hon. J. Travis Laster, Vice Chancellor.

Beeney: You made the decision to put the patents in the trust without knowing whether Alcatel had withdrawn from the pool?

Landmann: That’s correct. 

CVN is webcasting the MPEG v. Alcatel Lucent trial live. 

The MPEG v. Alcatel Lucent trial, a major patent-licensing battle between MPEG-LA and Alcatel-Lucent, is set to begin Monday in Delaware. The licensing royalties at stake could impact the availability of DVD and high-definition television patents to hundreds of consumer electronics makers.

MPEG LA is a firm that licenses a pool of essential patents for DVD players and other consumer electronics. Paris-based Alcatel joined the MPEG LA pool in 2003, thereby promising to make its patents available to pool  members.  Lucent was not a member of the MPEG-LA pool.

According to the complaint, before Alcatel purchased Lucent in 2006, Lucent placed several of its patents in a trust for the benefit of Alcatel-Lucent to prevent the Lucent patents from being automatically added to the MPEG LA pool.

MPEG LA alleges that Lucent’s agreement as an MPEG LA licensor obligated it to make available to licensees, through MPEG LA’s MPEG-2 Patent Portfolio License, all MPEG-2 essential patents that Alcatel could license or sub-license, and not to take any action to subvert that commitment.

UPDATE: According to Alcatel Lucent, the patents were placed in the trust to protect their full value, and in any case the patents were not “essential” patents to which MPEG-LA might assert any claim.

CVN is webcasting the MPEG-LA v. Alcatel Lucent trial live.